“Just as I have argued for compassion and fairness in life‚ I believe that terminally ill people should be treated with compassion and fairness when it comes to their death.

“This should include affording people who have reached the end stages of life the right to choose how and when to leave Mother Earth‚” said Tutu.

He said that he believed in the sanctity of life‚ “and that death is part of life”.

“Alongside the wonderful palliative care that exists‚ the choices available to the terminally ill should include dignified assisted death. It is a choice that I believe lawmakers should engage‚ enable and appropriately regulate‚” he said.